


my blood runs red

by guycecil



Category: D.Gray-man
Genre: Choking, Gen, Parasites, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-15
Updated: 2015-10-15
Packaged: 2018-04-26 11:13:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5002588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/guycecil/pseuds/guycecil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lavi, Sheril, and a tentative hold on identity, reality, objectivity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	my blood runs red

**Author's Note:**

> I really don't know how to warn for this fic, it's honestly just kind of gross all throughout. If there's anything you think I should have tagged let me know. The quotes from the end are from _The Tempest_ , by Shakespeare. Title from "Organs" by Of Monsters and Men.

Lavi drifts. The fever comes and goes, but mostly it just sits there. In the moments where he remembers where he is, who he is, what he’s doing, he feels disgusting -- sweating into the same uniform, bleeding into the same uniform, vomiting around the same uniform for three months, and the closest he comes to clean is when they dump water over his head so they can rouse him enough that he’ll feel it when they hurt him.

Sometimes he forgets that Bookman is there, but other times it’s all he can focus on. When they’re alone, sometimes, the old man will mumble under his breath -- or maybe he’s shouting. When Lavi’s head is fogged, he can hardly tell the difference. Sometimes he’ll catch a word, a phrase, a sentence, but rarely anything more than that. Most of the time, he just wonders what he’s saying.

Nothing is constant, and yet nothing changes. He is constantly aware of dull pain, an ache in his body, the constant heat behind his forehead, in his chest. He’s almost grateful for the water dumped over his head, the cool sensation running through him, setting shivers down his spine. It’s the only reprieve he gets from the neverending burn.

Sheril says something indistinct. Bookman doesn’t respond, as usual. Lavi can’t bring himself to resent the old man for that -- he’s always been so much better at this job than Lavi could ever be. They have history to protect, not each other. Even when Sheril’s hand slides around his throat, tipping his head back, fingers tight against his skin, Lavi can’t be angry with him.

If there’s anything he hates, it’s that he can’t see him. Unless he turns his head, the eyepatch blocks his view, and he can hardly turn his head when Sheril has his thumb brushing his jaw. The Noah leans down, murmuring in his ear just close enough that the words come across clear. “What do you think, boy?” he says. “Will your master save you this time?”

Bookman remains silent.

Sheril laughs. “Fine! No skin off my back.” His fingers tighten around Lavi’s throat with such surprising force that he coughs in surprise. “How unfaithful your master is,” Sheril tsks. “Not much good, your Bookman doctrine, is it? No wonder he lost the last one.”

His fingers tighten a little more. Lavi wheezes around them -- they’re just tight enough now that it restricts his airflow, but not enough to make it impossible. “Tell me, Bookman,” Sheril says.

The old man stays silent, and Sheril’s fingers dig further into Lavi’s skin. He has to force the air down, now. “Tell me!”

Still, Bookman says nothing. With a little snarl of frustration, Sheril squeezes hard enough to cut off all flow of air, and Lavi chokes fully. He coughs, but that only forces the last of the air out of his lungs, and his chest starts to burn. If he had the strength, he would try to fight it, but instead he just shakes, his vision blurring, his chest convulsing. Sheril laughs. “And now, Bookman? Will you let him suffocate?”

Bookman’s endless silence is his only response. Sheril’s nails dig tight into Lavi’s skin, and his body starts to give up, trembling. He gasps, his hands fly up to Sheril’s wrist, but there’s nothing he can do. His struggles weaken. His vision blacks out and his body slumps, and for a second, he honestly believes that Sheril will kill him this time, and he can’t say he fears it.

But he wakes. Sheril is still there, still talking -- or maybe he should say _again_ instead of _still_ , but there’s no sense of time in his place, so he doesn’t even know. He’s too tired to zone in to what Sheril’s saying, so he just lets it flow over him. This, he thinks, is the easiest he’s breathed in a long time, even with his body clogged from the sickness. At least the air will _move_.

There’s a hand sliding through his hair, and it might be Sheril or it might be Fiidora or it might be one of those bizarre hallucinations he has sometimes now -- Lenalee or Allen, murmuring that it’ll be okay, and he only knows they’re hallucinations because they started when he was still coherent enough to _talk_ to Bookman, and the old man could tell him there was no one there.

He can’t ask now, but he’s fairly certain that if Lenalee or Allen was actually here, they wouldn’t be sitting around giving him comfort. He hates his head for making it up, partially just for giving him that fake hope, and partially because he knows it’s that _stupid_ fucking heart again. There’s no use for that kind of thing, and especially not here, especially not now.

Sheril laughs, but he doesn’t know why, and then his voice turns sharp. The fingers in his hair tighten -- not a hallucination, then, he thinks -- and his head tips back against his will. He wheezes as it does, the burn of Sheril’s hand on his throat still fresh. Sheril barks some sort of command, and another hand comes around to slap him until he opens his eye.

He does so only to see Fiidora leaning over him, smiling down. He shies away involuntarily, desperate to avoid what’s coming, but the hand in his hair is insistent. The Noah laughs at him, and then slowly unravels his tongue from his mouth. It dangles down over his face, almost brushing his nose, and his stomach rolls at the sight of all those eyeballs, twisting and glinting. He can feel the panic begin to build in his chest, at the back of his throat, but he’s too weak to do anything about it.

Fiidora’s other hand comes up to hold the other side of his head, so he won’t move, he knows. He sobs, though he doesn’t mean to. “No,” he mumbles. “Don’t--”

“Listen to him beg, Bookman!” Sheril’s voice is suddenly clear as day, ringing through his ears and his senses are flooded. He’s too hot, too cold, shaking so hard that Fiidora’s hands are the only thing keeping his head in place, and he can hear every footstep, every nuance of Sheril’s voice, and even the dim room is too bright, he can see every nick and scar in the hideous tongue, and he can taste the bile in the back of his throat, and the smell of his own sickness clogs his nose. Sheril is suddenly crouched in front of him, arms braced on his knees. “What do you think, Junior?” he asks. “Will your master let you suffer this again?”

Lavi tries not to respond, but the tongue brushes his cheek, and he lets out a sound halfway between a moan and a sob. “No,” he begs.

“He won’t?” Sheril asks, an air of fake surprise tinging his tone. “How about that, Bookman? Junior thinks you’ll save him this time.” He spreads his fingers out over Lavi’s thighs. “All you have to do is open your mouth, and tell me what I need to know.”

Bookman doesn’t even twitch in response.

Sheril sighs. “Such a tragedy, Junior. A Bookman’s impartiality is famed, to be sure, but who knew it went this deep. To not even care enough to spare the boy you practically raised as your own son…” He tsks. “Well. Not even a Noah is that cold.” He snaps his fingers at Fiidora. “Take the stage, brother.”

The other Noah laughs a little, leans forward just slightly, and Lavi tries to fight it, he really does -- but his body is so weak, and Fiidora has his head clamped between his hands and Sheril is holding his legs. He can’t do anything but sob -- he feels like a child. He can’t tell if Bookman is watching.

His breath catches in his chest just a second too long. Fiidora’s tongue dangles over his mouth, twisting grotesquely, and he tries to close his eye but Sheril digs his nails into his thighs and he has to open it again.

The parasites slide into his body without resistance. He chokes against them, his body instinctively trying to drive out the foreign intruder, but it does nothing. It’s like sludge creeping through his body, down his throat to his stomach and then out through his veins, to the tips of his fingers and all the way down to his toes. Chills run down his spine while it happens, fast and slow all at once, and he burns everywhere the parasites touch. He can feel the sweat on his face, dripping from his chin. He doesn’t want to cry, but he can’t help it -- he thought that seeing how Allen saw akuma was the worst thing he could possibly experience, but he would trade this for that in a second.

His stomach roils when Fiidora leans back, tongue disappearing as he chuckles. Sheril gives him a pat on the leg. “How are you feeling, Junior?”

Lavi tries as hard as he can to resist his frantically rebelling stomach, but there’s not much he can do to stand up against a body worn down this much. He moans into closed lips, still fighting it. His throat convulses. His stomach muscles tense. He grips tight to the arms of the chair.

 _“Be strong,”_ Allen whispers in his ear.

He loses. He slumps forward, mouth falling open as he throws up parasites onto the floor. Sheril skitters back just in time and the vomit stains Lavi’s boots. He coughs, roughly, then sobs. It _burns_ , like magma in his blood. The parasites claw at his nerves, tear at his bones, and he doesn’t want to fucking cry, but he can’t stop. It hurts, it burns, and he’s so _tired_ , he can’t help the tears dropping into his lap.

"Aw, Junior!” Sheril reaches up, swipes a thumb across Lavi’s cheek, and turns to wave it in Bookman’s direction. “Look at that! Real tears! How about that, old man?” He drops his hand to Lavi’s shoulder to wipe off his thumb. “Does it hurt that bad, Junior?”

“Don’t touch me,” Lavi says, or tries to. Either way, something clearly gets the message across, because in the next second Sheril backhands him across the face. Not that it means much, when he’s done ten times worse with half the effort.

“Don’t talk back,” Sheril says, like he’s scolding a child. He lands a heavy hand on Lavi’s shoulder again, and the weight shifts Lavi just enough to make him dizzy. He groans, his eye falling shut, trying to keep his body under control. A flash of heat runs down the back of his neck. Something crawls under his skin, and he gags against the desire to tear at himself until he gets it out.

“Now then, old man.” Sheril squeezes Lavi’s shoulder. “A brand new batch of creepy crawlies in him, and who knows how hungry they are? There’s no telling what they’ll do to him. So. Tell me what you know, and we won’t have to find out.”

Nothing.

Sheril makes no sound as he shoves Lavi out of his chair. He lands heavily, coughing as it knocks the wind out of him and sets him dizzy again. Sheril plants a foot on the back of Lavi’s neck, and he freezes -- the weight is just this side of too heavy, too decisive.

“I’ll snap his neck,” Sheril says impassively. “I will cut his stomach open and watch the parasites spill out with his blood. I will break every single one of his ribs with precisely the right angle and force to make sure they pierce his heart and he will bleed into his own chest until his lungs fill with blood and he suffocates. I will leave him lying here on the floor and let the parasites eat at his nerves and his muscles and his organs until he withers down to nothing and he disappears. And you will watch it, because you can’t tear your eyes away from your dying apprentice, and even if that’s _really_ all he is to you, you will still feel the agony of losing another one and knowing your legacy will never continue. Unless.” He clicks his tongue. “Unless you give me my information.”

Still, nothing. Sheril pulls his foot away, hisses, and then digs a kick into Lavi’s side, but he can barely even react, as exhausted as he is. “Have some fun, Fiidora,” Sheril snarls. He stomps away, disappears. Somewhere, a door slams.

Fiidora laughs, and Lavi braces himself, another sob building. Part of his brain tells him to beg, to do whatever he has to if it means getting out of this, but he can’t find the will. The crawling under his skin intensifies and he submits himself to it.

 _“It’s okay,”_ Lenalee whispers. _“Let go.”_

So he does.

And when he wakes, back in his chair, there is a murmur in the air. It’s too indistinct for him to catch, and he has to take a moment to survey his body anyway, to make sure everything is still where it belongs. The heat hasn’t dissipated, but his stomach has at least calmed, and his fingers no longer itch with desperation to claw at his own skin. Now it’s just the sickness, and the old injuries (the bruises broken bones scabs and half-assed stitches), that keep their hold on him.

Eventually, the murmur clarifies enough that he can at least recognize the voice -- Bookman, reciting something to himself. The rhythm is familiar, like a heartbeat, and it lulls him into a comfortable trance. At least for now, they’re safe. A reprieve.

Finally, Bookman’s voice raises enough for Lavi to catch it. “Had I been any god of power,” he recites, “I would have sunk the sea within the earth or ere it should the good ship so have swallow’d and the fraughting souls within her.” A pause. “Be collected: No more amazement: tell your piteous heart there’s no harm done.”

“O, woe the day,” Lavi mumbles.

Bookman falls silent for a moment, longer than before. For a split second of confusion and concern, Lavi thinks he’s forgotten the next line, but then, softly, “No harm. I have done nothing but in care of thee, of thee, my dear one, thee, my daughter, who art ignorant of what thou art, nought knowing of whence I am, nor that I am more better than Prospero, master of a full poor cell, and thy no greater father.”

Lavi takes in a deep breath. “More to know,” he says, “did never meddle with my thoughts.”

“‘Tis time I should inform thee farther,” Bookman says. “Lend thy hand, and pluck my magic garment from me. So.”

Bookman continues, but Lavi’s strength fails him, and when it’s his turn for the next line, he can’t quite bring himself to recite it.

Bookman picks up where he can’t, though, and slowly, for the first time in as long as Lavi can remember that he’s been here, he drifts off, with Bookman’s voice clearing a gentle path for him towards sleep.

 


End file.
